Piers Morgan Pegged to Fill Larry King's Suspenders

Sept. 8, 2010— -- CNN's found a man fit to fill Larry King's suspenders.

Today, the cable news network announced that Piers Morgan will replace veteran interviewer King come January, confirming rumors that had been swirling since King's June declaration that he's done with the nightly talk show grind.

"Piers has made his name posing tough questions to public figures, holding them accountable for their words and deeds," CNN/U.S. president Jon Klein said in a statement released by the network. "He is able to look at all aspects of the news with style and humor with an occasional good laugh in the process. He is a natural fit with Anderson Cooper, Eliot Spitzer and Kathleen Parker in our prime time lineup, and the ideal choice to update the storied tradition of newsmaker talk on CNN."

While American audiences probably know Morgan, 45, best as a judge on the NBC reality competition series "America's Got Talent" and as a winner of Donald Trump's reality competition show "Celebrity Apprentice," he's known in Britain as a journalist, of sorts.

In 1994, when Morgan was 28 years old, Rupert Murdoch appointed him the youngest-ever editor of the News of the World. Following a stint at the popular British tabloid, he moved to the Daily Mirror, where he served as editor-in-chief from 1995 until 2004. He also appeared on the BBC, ITV and "Britain's Got Talent" before hopping the pond to American TV.

"I am thrilled to be joining CNN, and very much looking forward to bringing my own style of interviewing to the world's biggest, and best, TV news organization," Morgan said in a statement released by CNN. "Perhaps most pertinently, I have watched 'Larry King Live' for much of the last 25 years, and dreamed of one day filling the legendary suspenders of the man I consider to be the greatest TV interviewer of them all."